When Q said it was going to be Biblical, I don’t think of that primarily in terms of scale. I think of it in terms of prophecy being fulfilled. It leads me to believe we are living in time when that is happening, and that prophecies are right now being fulfilled in ways that are quite different from what people have been taught to believe about them. For example, no one could have reconciled the many prophecies about the Messiah until they looked back at them in hindsight, even though they thought they had it pretty well worked out at the time. The prophets said the Messiah would come from Egypt, from Nazareth, and from Bethlehem, and only after His advent did people understand how those three things fit together without creating a paradox. The powers that did be at the time completely rejected Him because He didn’t fit into the box they made from their interpretations of prophecy (the conquering hero), even though He was fulfilling prophecy by doing unprecedented miracles right in front of their eyes. The same sort of interpretive box-making is still going on today, in precious doctrines of men people think are the doctrines of God, and neither will they see it when prophecy begins to unfold all around them.
In light of all that, I think it would be good to consider how the following prophecies might relate to current events:
(Psalm 2: 1-6, NKJV) Why do the nations rage, And the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, And the rulers take counsel together, Against the Lord and against His Anointed, saying, “Let us break their bonds in pieces And cast away their cords from us.” He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; The Lord shall hold them in derision. Then He shall speak to them in His wrath, And distress them in His deep displeasure: “Yet I have set My King On My holy hill of Zion.”
(Isaiah 24:21-22, NKJV) It shall come to pass in that day That the Lord will punish on high the host of exalted ones, And on the earth the kings of the earth. They will be gathered together, As prisoners are gathered in the pit, And will be shut up in the prison; After many days they will be punished.
(Revelation 18:1-3) After these things I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was illuminated with his glory. And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird! For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury.”
(Revelation 18:7-8, NKJV) In the measure that she glorified herself and lived luxuriously, in the same measure give her torment and sorrow; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as queen, and am no widow, and will not see sorrow.’ Therefore her plagues will come in one day—death and mourning and famine. And she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her.
I realize am presenting these scriptures out of context, to which some might rightly object; but even though I am a great fan of context, there is much that can be inferred in these sections of texts. I only present them here for consideration in light of world events and in light of what we know has been happening behind what we can see. We know what Babylon is. We know that God is taking it down. We know that the great ones of the earth have conspired to drive God out of the consciousness of mankind. We know they are facing punishment for their crimes. And, we know that God has already won the war before they ever picked up a sword.
Free note: In Psalm 2, “Yet I have set My King on my holy hill of Zion.” “My King,” is Jesus. Zion is the hill of King David’s city where the king’s palace was and where the Temple of God would be erected by his son. This is a metaphor declaring that God has complete and utter control in spite of whatever his enemies might plot against Him.
Psalm 37 is one of my favorites - that one might also be prophetic? "Fret not thyself because of evildoers...."
Yes, I think so, but this psalm is also full of promises upon which we may hang our faith. We must understand that the New Covenant is not like the old national covenant with the Jews (the Law of Moses) and doesn't resemble it. The new covenant doesn't operate like the law in any way. It operates like God's covenant with Abraham, which is by faith. Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness. We receive things from God because we believe He will give them to us. Jesus didn't just heal righteous people who came to him. But he healed everyone who had the faith to receive it from Him, and He commended many for having it, even going so far as to say, your faith has made you whole.
Jeremiah prophesied about what the new covenant would be like:
“Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah—not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”
The new covenant operates an continues by faith. Peter said it was by the promises of God that we partake of divine nature and escape the corruption of the world (2 Peter 1:4). Paul said all promises of God are all yes and Amen to us (2 Cor. 1:20). All means all, and that includes the promises He made in the Old Testament. Jesus fulfilled the law, becoming the ultimate sacrifice, and its operation is no longer necessary in the life of a believer. Paul rebuked the Galatians for thinking they had to obey a commandment of the law, just one, mind you, to secure their membership in the new covenant (entire book of Galatians). It was a compromise that was going backwards, and he said it would make grace unavailable to them because they were trying to obtain it the wrong way.
Sorry to go on about this when your question required only a simple answer, but it's a pet peeve of mine. I struggled so many years with condemnation until I realized it all came from the law having infected Christian teaching. The law is good for providing a picture of what righteousness looks like, but you don't get anywhere expecting it to operate in your life to bring condemnation and curses upon you for mistakes and failures. The only way to have true victory over sin and failure is to throw all that away and grab hold of the grace of God, which He gives freely in Christ (Hebrews 4:16). Understand me, I am not saying grace is a license to sin. I am saying it is the way out of it. It is looking up to bright possibilities with God and not inwards to become fixed upon personal failures and trying to compensate. In Christ we can expect the endless goodness of God, not an endless struggle with a God who is hard to get along with.
Please forgive me for my long-winded digression from your point, dear friend.
No worries about the reply. I liked it. Remembering that we are saved by grace is always a good thing, because condemnation comes at us from every angle sometimes.